World's Most Dangerous: Hornet Superbike

As soon as I laid eyes on the Hornet Superbike, I thought of the sheer bloody carnage that would ensue if I were to ever saddle up and hit the throttle on the bad boy. Being able to visualize your own horrifying, flaming demise is a sure sign that a product is dangerous and not for you.

Motorists everywhere will be happy to note that the Hornet is just a concept. So you won't have some smug douchebag cutting between vehicles in traffic on one of these anytime soon.

Now that you know that it won't be the cause of any fatalities or injuries, here's the scoop on it. While it appears to be a very wobbly one-wheeler, it actually packs double the number of wheels as your average motorcycle. The two main wheels are located side by side rather than front and back. A second set of smaller stabilizer wheels come into play when the bike is parked, balancing it through gyroscopic force.

When the rider hops on, he tilts the bike forward and pulls the stabilizer wheels off the ground. That's right--the stabilizer wheels only work when the bike is at rest. You're on your own when this thing is in motion.

As far as power, the Hornet is powered by dual 74 hp (55 kW) hydrogen fuel-cell six-phase Neodymium-Iron (Nd-Fe) electric motors in the wheels. Sure, that sounds fancy, but remember, it's just a concept, so it's easy to tack a bunch of scientific words together and make something sound like a technological masterpiece. Top speed is close to 150 mph.

So, to sum up, the Hornet is a big ball with motors in the wheels on which you crouch into a near-fetal position and try desperately to balance as you tear across pavement at speeds up to 146 mph.

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